The Arizona sentinel., 1887-01-15


 pipe and pointing out the one designat- ed, "while not so big as any of the others, was the toughest customer of them all and weighed, when dressed, nigh on thousand pounds. There are three distinct kind of bears in this coun- try, and also a fourth kind, a mongrel species. There are the grizzly, the cin- namon, and the black bear; then comes the fourth already mentioned, called the silver tip, cross between the grizzly and the cinnamon, and the most dangerous of them all, for he possesses the ferociousness of the former, while he has all the activity of the latter. The silver tip seldom comes down out of the mountains but lives habitually in high attitudes, and subsists for the most part on the flesh of the animals he kills. The grizzly also eats flesh, but he is fond of berries too. The cinnamon eats only roots and herbs, while the black bear makes regular descents among the foot hills and in the valleys searching for honey and berries. A black bear was discovered last fall on the prairie about four miles from Fort Missoula. Some of the soldiers discovered him and gave chase, and they actually rounded that fellow up, preventing him from getting back into the mountains, until he was driven smack into the fort, where he was killed on the parade ground.
 "But, speaking of them skins over there, I'll tell you the whole story just as it happened to myself. It was somewhere about ten years ago, when I was prospecting over in the neighbor- hood of Deadwood, that belonged to party of four who had agreed to work that year in partnership. We struck out one morning from camp for days work among the mountains, each fel- low going in different direction, and agreeing to meet that night in Dead wood to compare notes and share the finds among all alike. started up the gulch, following an old Indian trail four miles or better, then branched off up the mountain side to see if couldn't find the mother of rich piece of rock which I had picked up in the gulch the day previous, and which was just sparkling with pyrites of gold, iron and lead. It was about two o'clock in the afternoon, when I was making my way out of the mountains and back to join the boys, that came to a thicket of quaking asps. Now, l have seen asps quake often, and I have seen them quake so hard, too, that an Eastern bummer's jim-jams is nothing to the way those trees shake; but the little thicket in front of me was just attending and a-howling as if forty-mile wind was blowing through it. Says l to myself: Old boy, you've got an elk; you've got an elk, and no mistake; so look sharp to your gun and the meat is yours Slipping six cartridges into the magazine, cooked my gun, and hold ing it ready, crept softly through the bushes to see what kind of circus was going on.
 ''You can believe me or not, stranger, but as sure as Moses was swapped in the bulrushes, clear me out for tender foot, but saw three bears in little clearing going at it hammer and tongs, fighting to the death. Two of them were cinnamon mates and the other was a silver tip. Lord, how the fur did fly! The plucky silver tip would slap first one and then the other The cin- namon cusses didn't seem to have sense enough to tackle the big mongrel to- gether, but they came up one at a time, only to get a dose which the other fellow always had ready for them. The silver | tip knocked them out every time and won every round just as he pleased. Pretty soon the pair began to weaken, and then old Ephraim put in his licks thick and fast. He knocked the male flat and proceeded to hug the other. He simply squeezed the life out of her, for could hear bones snap and crack from where I was hid. The male by this time had recovered a few of his senses and sat upon his hannches like a dog to see how the day was going; but the wise old silver tip, dropping the fe- male for a minute, walked over to where the dazed brute was squatted and brought him such whack beside the head with his big paw that the poor fellow never did get over it. He simply rolled over on the ground and died without another protest.
 q was much interested in the out come, and remained an anxious spec tator of events to see what the victor would do now that both enemies were slain. Smelling of each and rolling them over to see if thoroughly dead, he went to work in a business-like manner to cache the bodies. Becoming satisfied that life was extinct, he seized the fe- male by the back of the neck and dragged her off to a point about forty yards distant, when he halted, dropped his burden and began to paw industri- ously at the ground. He worked away until large hole had been scooped out, when he rolled the body into it and covered the same with brush, twigs, leaves and dirt. By this time I began to understand what the willy old fellow was about. He was simply laying in a store of winter food. Returning to the other carcass he gave it an afectionate squeeze or two and dragged it off in the opposite direction twenty-five or thirty yards. He proceeded to do exactly ir